PREHISTORIC THOUGHTS IN THE DIGITAL AGELucy of Hadar Blog and Twitter Personality Launched

CHICAGO (Sept 10, 2012) – Lucy of Hadar isn’t just a skeleton sitting in a museum anymore. With her own blog, http://www.skeletons3among3us , and Twitter feed, @Lucy_of_Hadar, she scans news feeds and digs into her past to keep her growing following up-to-date on the latest discoveries in bone-land and tell tales from long ago – 3.2 million years ago to be relatively exact.
Lucy uses her 140 characters well, saving some for a link to a photo from particularly nifty news item, such as this recent discovery: “DNA vs. fossil evidence. Did prehominids & humans co-exist in Africa after all? You judge. http://tinyurl.com/fosdna  pic.twitter.com/kKbzMJzl .”
Sometimes she plays a little fast and loose with the truth, such as this teaser for her blog: “Promised 1st Terror Bird story is up! http://tinyurl.com/sk3us .” The terror bird story is there, and it’s a doozy, but terror birds were mostly in South America and she’s from Ethiopia.
Of course, there is a marketing angle to all this so some liberties can be taken. Lucy is more like @SuetheTrex drawing people to events at the Field Museum in Chicago than the fake Mayor Rahm of the same city, a feat eventually claimed by a college professor, who gathered more than 50,000 followers and posted 1,955 tweets over five months, all in a parody of the mayoral race of 2010-11, but not selling a thing.
“Lucy and I talk almost every day,” said Jean Latz Griffin, owner of CyberINK, the company that gave Lucy her soapbox. “Of course we hope that the interest in Lucy will spill over into sales of the company’s skeleton-themed mugs, water bottles, mouse pads and posters. “But I don’t push her. We agreed when she signed on that she would have free rein to tweet and blog as she wished.”
When about 40 percent of Lucy’s skeleton was discovered in 1974, she was the earliest known skeleton from the human branch of the primate family tree and part of the species, Australopithecus afarensis.  She lost that title in 1992 to another hominin, Ardi, who lived 4.4 million years ago. But Lucy doesn’t mind the competition. She even tweeted her congratulations to Karabo when his more-complete though younger skeleton was found in July.
Just as Lucy has come to life on Twitter, the skeletons on the CyberINK products are active. They swim, take baths, ride bikes, dry their red hair, stroll through snowy villages, walk their dogs and hold meetings with laptops and briefcases.
“Our skeletons aren’t just pictures,” Griffin said. “They inspire viewers with questions. ‘Is that how my bones look when I swim? Is that what we are like on the inside?’ Does my dog really have all those ribs?”
CyberINK’s skeleton products are sold in bookstores and museums across the country, often in conjunction with a Body World exhibit. The newest museum to stock them is the Mütter Museum in Philadelphia.  First orders went out last week out to Anchorage Museum in Alaska for their Body Worlds Show, Matthews MCW Bookstore in Wauwatosa, Wisconsin and RFUMS Bookstore in North Chicago, Illinois.The products are also available on www.cyberinkonline.com.

About CyberINK
CyberINK is an independent publisher in the northwest suburbs of Chicago that specializes in quirky skeleton products and books on various topics. Founded in 1998, CyberINK also provides graphic arts services.